Chompy
Active Member
Well, lets start things off by telling about my personal life and why I stopped playing last years season. One of the reasons I stopped playing was because of going to school part time and working part time with my dad. The other reason is because there were other things I wanted to invest my money on, such as video games and such. Therefore, I did not want to invest another $100 or more on making a new deck. The deck I ran before was Gothitelle, and I did decent with it (won a BR with it). When cities came around, I quickly realized that Gothitelle did not stand much of a chance against the newer decks, so I decided to put it off for the year and invest my money on other things I am interested in. Pokemon is such an expensive game when your investing your money on expensive cards, just so you can compete in tournaments...
During the summer, I went over to my aunts house for a garage sale and managed to sell my older cards for $70 in total. All of a sudden, after selling my cards to the people, it somehow inspired me to start playing again. I researched on the PokeGym board to see what decks were winning and I came across a deck a Japanese player won with, which is Hydreigon/Darkrai. I had no idea on what the cards did at the time, but I wanted to give it a try online anyway. I practiced with that deck, just to get the feel on how the deck works and found myself winning a lot of games with it. Also, I tried out other decks like Empoleon, but the damage output wasn't enough to win me games against ex Pokemon. Accelgor/Gothitelle was another option I wanted to try, but I found the deck to lose consistency as the game progressed. Out of the three decks I played, I decided to go with Hydreigon/Darkrai, since I had not only the most sucess with it, but I love the strategy behind the deck.
I went to a tournament at Chicago last weekend and went 3-2 with Hydreigon/Darkrai. I was quite content with my record, considering I stopped playing last year. While I was there, I got some street passes on my 3DS and managed to get some pink pieces
.
After the Chicago tournament, I looked over at my deck to see where I went wrong. I made some tweaks on my deck and experimented some techs that could help me win the matches against other decks.
I playtested on PlayTCG one night this week and went over to my aunts house. All of the kids that my aunt lives with are interested in the game. Right now, the kids are still in the learning process, but they understand most of the basic rules of the game and how certain decks work. We did a rotation battle where we had 6 players (including myself and my aunt). Basically what rotation battle is everyone would move one seat over to the right after each round, giving them somewhat of an idea of how tournaments work. (They all played with the competitive decks I provided for them) After 3 rounds, the top 4 players with the best record would do a top cut match best of 3. Everyone had fun, and its something that we will do more often!
Onto the tournament scene...
I have my decklist all ready and right away I noticed most of the players were running Hydreigon/Darkrai, some were running Empoleon, Zekrom/Eeelektrik, Garchomp/Altaria, and Rayeels. Suddenly, I found out they were selling the new tins and I could have bought those earlier this week had I known, so I had to borrow 3 of Phil's Darkrai ex's for the tournament.
Now, onto the matches...
Round 1. Kaleb ??? (Darkrai/Hydreigon)
We flipped over our cards. He went first. Right away, I noticed he is running the Darkrai/Hydreigon deck and I could potentially lose the match if he sets up. Luckily, he had nothing going, while I was able to get my setup quickly. The interesting thing though was that he told me he had a juniper in his hand the whole time until turn 4 and decides to discard his hand after knocking out his first Deino. At one point, I had 3 prizes left to his 6 and he junk hunts for a ultra ball and a rare candy. I played N to deny him from getting out Hydreigon and he showed me what he had in his hand, which was Bianca, Candy, Ultraball, Dark Patch, and Energy. Then I kept on catchering up the Deinos to deny him from ever getting out the Hydreigons and Darkrai pretty much swept the match from there.
Win: 1-0
Round 2: Ben R. (Zekrom/Eelektrik/Thundurus/Mewtwo ex)
Once again, I go second and I am staring down a Thunderus with a T1 charge and a Zekrom BW on the bench. I open with a lone Sableye with Darkrai on the bench and I wanted to try to thin my deck down as much as possible by playing the ultra ball and level ball to get 2 Deinos. Then I played catcher on his Zekrom to stall for some time, so I can manually setup. Now I am down to 0 cards and had to pass. He draws and plays the first catcher on the first Deino, then a switch to promote a fully powered up Thunderus and knocks that out. Right now, I am staring down a fully powered Thunderus, Zekrom with no energies, and 2 Tynamos on the bench. Things started to look hopeless for me, but I managed to keep up the match by top decking a random receiver and playing juniper. I got out my 3rd Deino and play a 2nd catcher on his Zekrom and used junk hunt to grab an Ultra Ball and Catcher. Once again, he does the same thing he did last turn and takes another prize. By then, I had a Hydreigon, Darkrai, Sableye with 1 energy. At one point, I was debating as to whether or not I should bench down the Shaymin, so I can draw more cards from Bianca, but then again it can be catcher bait and I was pretty confident Shaymin with be safe that turn. I took the risk and did it anyway. He gets out 2 Eelektriks and dynomotors the Zekrom, brings up the fully powered Zekrom, plays a 3rd catcher, and knocks out my Shaymin ex with Bolt Strike. Things were not looking good for me at all, I still had 6, while he has 2 prizes left. I played N to reduce his hand size from 7 to 2 and managed to slowly make a comeback with Darkrai by Night Spearing the Zekrom for the knock out and 30 to Thunderus. He promotes Thunderus and benches down Zekrom ex with an eviolite attached and does 80. I max potioned Darkrai and knocked out his Thunderus. He plays N and gets an extremely lucky top deck, a DCE and his 4th catcher on my Hydreigon. Now he is down to 1, while I have 4 prizes left. Even though he was far ahead in prizes, I still didn't give up and saw the light in the tunnel. I had a Siglyph fully powered and I catched up the Eelektriks from night spear. From there on, he suddenly fell apart and both of his Eelektriks were knocked out and all he had left was Zekrom ex to my Siglyph and scoops.
Win 2-0
Game 3: Toby Nelson (Rayquaza/Rayquaza ex/Mewtwo/Raikou ex/Eels)
I went first for the first time of the season. He opens with a shiny Rayquaza. I get myset up going and managed to pull of a crucial Bianca. From the 5 cards, I top decked a rare candy and a Hydreigon on turn 3 and started to night spear away. All 3 of his Eels were gone from Darkrai ex. By then, he had on his field Rayquaza with an energy, 2 Raikou ex, Rayquaza ex with 2 Fire and 2 Electric, while I had 2 Hydreigons, 2 Darkrai, Sigylyph, and a Sableye. Being that he passed that turn. I was able to get away with Sableye's junk hunt to retrieve the catchers I had to discard earlier. He used up the last catcher on my eviolited Darkrai and made an attempt to stall with Raikous thunder fang and flipped heads 2 turns in a row. Eventually, he was able to knock out my Darkrai ex from Rayquaza and I promote Hydreigon and swept his entire field with Hydreigon alone.
Win 3-0
Game 4: Jimmy Ballard (Top Cut Comics) (Empoleon/Terrakion/Stunkfish/Mew ex)
My hand looked pretty ugly, but I had Bianca to help me out from that situation. Jimmy opened with 2 Piplups, while I open with a lone Sableye. I bench the Shaymin ex, so I can draw more cards from Bianca and I got the first Deino. I was like "If he catchers up the Deino and knocks him out with Empoleon, I am done for". He did get the Empoleon turn 2, but he did not get the catcher and did attack command for 50 on my Sableye instead. I proceed with my setup and I started to night spear away on his Empoleons. Then, he attaches the Giant Cloak on both of his Empoleons, benches Stunkfish, plays switch, max potions, and energy on Stunkfish and took the first knock out on my Sableye on the bench. I eventually knock out his Stunkfish, while placing 30 on his Empoleon's. He brings out Empoleon, while my Darkrai has 8 damage counters, and I realized if he benched 3 more Pokemon down, he can OHKO Darkrai ex. Of course, he benched 2 Stunkfish and Terrakion and knocked out my Darkrai ex. This is where Shaymin ex comes in and shines on the spotlight. I equipped the eviolite on the Shaymin and used Revenge Blast for 120 on his Empoleons that had 100 HP left. From there, Shaymin swept the field and the game was over.
Win 4-0
Game 5: Casey Smith (Shen) (Empoleon/Terrakion/Mew ex)
Casey gets all 4 of the Piplups out on turn 2, but no Empoleon. I proceed with my setup and started taking prizes left and right with my eviolited Darkrai ex. He promotes Terrakion and does retaliated for 160. I max potion my heavily damaged Darkrai, and knock out his Terrakion with Hydreigon in one hit, then he promotes Empoleon and attack command for 70. By then, I had a 2nd Hydregigon and knock out his Empoleon in one hit with Hydreigon. Casey scooped and realized I can grab the max potions back from the discard pile, so I can deny him from drawing any prizes. Therefore the game was over when I had 3 to his 6.
Win 5-0
Game 6: Karol Nowak (JPN Gallade) (Darkrai/Hydreigon)
Neither one of us had the greatest hands, and we both went off to a slow start. He made an attempt to catcher up the damage Deino and does double hit for 1 heads. I get a darkrai out there, retreat back to my Sableye and junk hunk. Again, he played another catcher on my Zwelious and double hit and gets 1 head. I top deck a Hydreigon and Juniper away my hand for 7 and managed to sweep his field with Darkrai. He promotes Sableye and uses the confuse ray attack to stall me out, but flipped tails. Then I knock two of his Pokemon out at once with Darkrai. His 30 HP Deino and Sableye and that was the end of the match.
6-0
After the tournament ended, PokePress wanted to interview me on how I did and the deck I played. The video should come up soon.
Overall, I had a great great experience, it was fun seeing PokeMaMa and everyone there! I was also happy that I got some pink pieces from my 3DS
-Ricky-
During the summer, I went over to my aunts house for a garage sale and managed to sell my older cards for $70 in total. All of a sudden, after selling my cards to the people, it somehow inspired me to start playing again. I researched on the PokeGym board to see what decks were winning and I came across a deck a Japanese player won with, which is Hydreigon/Darkrai. I had no idea on what the cards did at the time, but I wanted to give it a try online anyway. I practiced with that deck, just to get the feel on how the deck works and found myself winning a lot of games with it. Also, I tried out other decks like Empoleon, but the damage output wasn't enough to win me games against ex Pokemon. Accelgor/Gothitelle was another option I wanted to try, but I found the deck to lose consistency as the game progressed. Out of the three decks I played, I decided to go with Hydreigon/Darkrai, since I had not only the most sucess with it, but I love the strategy behind the deck.
I went to a tournament at Chicago last weekend and went 3-2 with Hydreigon/Darkrai. I was quite content with my record, considering I stopped playing last year. While I was there, I got some street passes on my 3DS and managed to get some pink pieces
.After the Chicago tournament, I looked over at my deck to see where I went wrong. I made some tweaks on my deck and experimented some techs that could help me win the matches against other decks.
I playtested on PlayTCG one night this week and went over to my aunts house. All of the kids that my aunt lives with are interested in the game. Right now, the kids are still in the learning process, but they understand most of the basic rules of the game and how certain decks work. We did a rotation battle where we had 6 players (including myself and my aunt). Basically what rotation battle is everyone would move one seat over to the right after each round, giving them somewhat of an idea of how tournaments work. (They all played with the competitive decks I provided for them) After 3 rounds, the top 4 players with the best record would do a top cut match best of 3. Everyone had fun, and its something that we will do more often!
Onto the tournament scene...
I have my decklist all ready and right away I noticed most of the players were running Hydreigon/Darkrai, some were running Empoleon, Zekrom/Eeelektrik, Garchomp/Altaria, and Rayeels. Suddenly, I found out they were selling the new tins and I could have bought those earlier this week had I known, so I had to borrow 3 of Phil's Darkrai ex's for the tournament.
Now, onto the matches...
Round 1. Kaleb ??? (Darkrai/Hydreigon)
We flipped over our cards. He went first. Right away, I noticed he is running the Darkrai/Hydreigon deck and I could potentially lose the match if he sets up. Luckily, he had nothing going, while I was able to get my setup quickly. The interesting thing though was that he told me he had a juniper in his hand the whole time until turn 4 and decides to discard his hand after knocking out his first Deino. At one point, I had 3 prizes left to his 6 and he junk hunts for a ultra ball and a rare candy. I played N to deny him from getting out Hydreigon and he showed me what he had in his hand, which was Bianca, Candy, Ultraball, Dark Patch, and Energy. Then I kept on catchering up the Deinos to deny him from ever getting out the Hydreigons and Darkrai pretty much swept the match from there.
Win: 1-0
Round 2: Ben R. (Zekrom/Eelektrik/Thundurus/Mewtwo ex)
Once again, I go second and I am staring down a Thunderus with a T1 charge and a Zekrom BW on the bench. I open with a lone Sableye with Darkrai on the bench and I wanted to try to thin my deck down as much as possible by playing the ultra ball and level ball to get 2 Deinos. Then I played catcher on his Zekrom to stall for some time, so I can manually setup. Now I am down to 0 cards and had to pass. He draws and plays the first catcher on the first Deino, then a switch to promote a fully powered up Thunderus and knocks that out. Right now, I am staring down a fully powered Thunderus, Zekrom with no energies, and 2 Tynamos on the bench. Things started to look hopeless for me, but I managed to keep up the match by top decking a random receiver and playing juniper. I got out my 3rd Deino and play a 2nd catcher on his Zekrom and used junk hunt to grab an Ultra Ball and Catcher. Once again, he does the same thing he did last turn and takes another prize. By then, I had a Hydreigon, Darkrai, Sableye with 1 energy. At one point, I was debating as to whether or not I should bench down the Shaymin, so I can draw more cards from Bianca, but then again it can be catcher bait and I was pretty confident Shaymin with be safe that turn. I took the risk and did it anyway. He gets out 2 Eelektriks and dynomotors the Zekrom, brings up the fully powered Zekrom, plays a 3rd catcher, and knocks out my Shaymin ex with Bolt Strike. Things were not looking good for me at all, I still had 6, while he has 2 prizes left. I played N to reduce his hand size from 7 to 2 and managed to slowly make a comeback with Darkrai by Night Spearing the Zekrom for the knock out and 30 to Thunderus. He promotes Thunderus and benches down Zekrom ex with an eviolite attached and does 80. I max potioned Darkrai and knocked out his Thunderus. He plays N and gets an extremely lucky top deck, a DCE and his 4th catcher on my Hydreigon. Now he is down to 1, while I have 4 prizes left. Even though he was far ahead in prizes, I still didn't give up and saw the light in the tunnel. I had a Siglyph fully powered and I catched up the Eelektriks from night spear. From there on, he suddenly fell apart and both of his Eelektriks were knocked out and all he had left was Zekrom ex to my Siglyph and scoops.
Win 2-0
Game 3: Toby Nelson (Rayquaza/Rayquaza ex/Mewtwo/Raikou ex/Eels)
I went first for the first time of the season. He opens with a shiny Rayquaza. I get myset up going and managed to pull of a crucial Bianca. From the 5 cards, I top decked a rare candy and a Hydreigon on turn 3 and started to night spear away. All 3 of his Eels were gone from Darkrai ex. By then, he had on his field Rayquaza with an energy, 2 Raikou ex, Rayquaza ex with 2 Fire and 2 Electric, while I had 2 Hydreigons, 2 Darkrai, Sigylyph, and a Sableye. Being that he passed that turn. I was able to get away with Sableye's junk hunt to retrieve the catchers I had to discard earlier. He used up the last catcher on my eviolited Darkrai and made an attempt to stall with Raikous thunder fang and flipped heads 2 turns in a row. Eventually, he was able to knock out my Darkrai ex from Rayquaza and I promote Hydreigon and swept his entire field with Hydreigon alone.
Win 3-0
Game 4: Jimmy Ballard (Top Cut Comics) (Empoleon/Terrakion/Stunkfish/Mew ex)
My hand looked pretty ugly, but I had Bianca to help me out from that situation. Jimmy opened with 2 Piplups, while I open with a lone Sableye. I bench the Shaymin ex, so I can draw more cards from Bianca and I got the first Deino. I was like "If he catchers up the Deino and knocks him out with Empoleon, I am done for". He did get the Empoleon turn 2, but he did not get the catcher and did attack command for 50 on my Sableye instead. I proceed with my setup and I started to night spear away on his Empoleons. Then, he attaches the Giant Cloak on both of his Empoleons, benches Stunkfish, plays switch, max potions, and energy on Stunkfish and took the first knock out on my Sableye on the bench. I eventually knock out his Stunkfish, while placing 30 on his Empoleon's. He brings out Empoleon, while my Darkrai has 8 damage counters, and I realized if he benched 3 more Pokemon down, he can OHKO Darkrai ex. Of course, he benched 2 Stunkfish and Terrakion and knocked out my Darkrai ex. This is where Shaymin ex comes in and shines on the spotlight. I equipped the eviolite on the Shaymin and used Revenge Blast for 120 on his Empoleons that had 100 HP left. From there, Shaymin swept the field and the game was over.
Win 4-0
Game 5: Casey Smith (Shen) (Empoleon/Terrakion/Mew ex)
Casey gets all 4 of the Piplups out on turn 2, but no Empoleon. I proceed with my setup and started taking prizes left and right with my eviolited Darkrai ex. He promotes Terrakion and does retaliated for 160. I max potion my heavily damaged Darkrai, and knock out his Terrakion with Hydreigon in one hit, then he promotes Empoleon and attack command for 70. By then, I had a 2nd Hydregigon and knock out his Empoleon in one hit with Hydreigon. Casey scooped and realized I can grab the max potions back from the discard pile, so I can deny him from drawing any prizes. Therefore the game was over when I had 3 to his 6.
Win 5-0
Game 6: Karol Nowak (JPN Gallade) (Darkrai/Hydreigon)
Neither one of us had the greatest hands, and we both went off to a slow start. He made an attempt to catcher up the damage Deino and does double hit for 1 heads. I get a darkrai out there, retreat back to my Sableye and junk hunk. Again, he played another catcher on my Zwelious and double hit and gets 1 head. I top deck a Hydreigon and Juniper away my hand for 7 and managed to sweep his field with Darkrai. He promotes Sableye and uses the confuse ray attack to stall me out, but flipped tails. Then I knock two of his Pokemon out at once with Darkrai. His 30 HP Deino and Sableye and that was the end of the match.
6-0
After the tournament ended, PokePress wanted to interview me on how I did and the deck I played. The video should come up soon.
Overall, I had a great great experience, it was fun seeing PokeMaMa and everyone there! I was also happy that I got some pink pieces from my 3DS
-Ricky-
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